The Question They Won’t Ask

It’s not bias when journalism reports reality—it’s bias when reality threatens power

The fatal conceit in Bari Weiss’s question—“why does the country think you’re biased?”—and in the entire PirateWires critique of

Heather Cox Richardson

is the undefended premise that Republican distrust of journalism constitutes evidence journalism has failed rather than evidence that coordinated disinformation has succeeded.

Let me propose a more interesting question: Why do Republicans systematically believe demonstrable falsehoods at rates suggesting not legitimate disagreement but information ecosystem collapse?

Why does a majority believe the 2020 election was stolen when it wasn’t? Why are they systematically unaware that Trump is enriching himself through the presidency? Why don’t they know the DOJ is being weaponized against enemies while loyalists receive pardons? Why do they think Trump has “good and benevolent reasons” for deploying federal forces against American cities?

This isn’t a perception problem that journalism created. This is the outcome journalism is trying to cover—and getting attacked for covering accurately.

Blake Dodge

and

Katherine Dee

’s PirateWires piece demands that Richardson consider Trump might have legitimate reasons for his actions. They write: “Presumably, Trump could have reasons for doing what he’s doing.” That single word—presumably—reveals everything about their methodology. It inverts the burden of proof completely: those warning about authoritarianism must prove every detail beyond doubt, while power gets presumed benevolence by default.

But we know Trump doesn’t have good reasons. Not as partisan assertion but as documented reality.

Good reasons for warrantless mass detentions of American citizens? That’s a Fourth Amendment violation. Good reasons for having his adviser call judicial review “insurrection”? That’s authoritarian rejection of constitutional governance. Good reasons for deploying ICE to the Super Bowl because the performer is Puerto Rican? That’s ethnic intimidation of American citizens. Good reasons for threatening to use American cities as “military training grounds”? That’s fascist strongman rhetoric.

We know his reasons because he tells us: dominance, revenge, punishing enemies, demonstrating power. Stephen Miller—a literal Gríma Wormtongue whispering in the king’s ear—explicitly advocates using state power for ethnic enforcement. Trump publicly admits his motivations. The policy outcomes reveal the intent. Republican officials in Washington privately acknowledge what’s happening while publicly defending it.

Anybody paying attention knows this. Including the people demanding journalism extend infinite charitable interpretation to power whose motives are explicitly stated and whose outcomes reveal intent.

When journalism reports this accurately—when 60 Minutes covers constitutional violations, when Richardson helps 2.7 million subscribers recognize authoritarian patterns—they get attacked not for being factually wrong but for being insufficiently charitable to power.

Notice what never happens in either the Weiss intervention or the PirateWires attack: defense of what journalism is actually reporting. None of these self-styled warriors of neutral observation dares to argue that warrantless mass detentions are justified, that calling judicial review “insurrection” is legitimate, that deploying ICE to cultural events is appropriate. Because defending those actions explicitly would reveal the game. This is the moral vacuum of the anti-anti-Trump disposition—filled with opportunists, malcontents, and people with various degrees of bruised egos. They won’t defend what Trump does, but they’ll attack anyone who accurately reports it, wrapping their cowardice in sophisticated concern about methodology and procedure.

Instead, they attack journalism’s methodology. They obsess over Richardson’s imperfections while treating Trump’s presumed benevolence as neutral baseline. They demand that 60 Minutes explain why Republicans perceive bias without asking why Republicans believe systematic falsehoods.

There is room for legitimate critique of journalists—for factual errors, for editorial misjudgments, for coverage gaps. But that requires engaging their facts, not punishing them for reporting inconvenient truths. What Weiss and PirateWires offer isn’t critique but something more insidious: reframing accountability journalism itself as evidence of bias.

This is the inversion that reveals authoritarian capture: The press must justify its coverage to power while power is presumed benevolent by default. Report what’s happening and get accused of bias. Extend infinite charity to constitutional violations and get celebrated for objectivity.

Normal journalism: Power must justify its actions to citizens through free press holding it accountable.

Authoritarian journalism: Press must justify its coverage to power, treating accountability as evidence of bias.

Weiss walking into 60 Minutes to ask “why does the country think you’re biased?” without first asking whether that perception corresponds to reality isn’t sophisticated editorial judgment. It’s surrendering the epistemic ground that makes democratic accountability possible. It’s treating coordinated attacks on legitimate journalism as evidence requiring accommodation rather than as bad-faith manipulation requiring exposure and resistance.

And PirateWires publishing 5,000 words demanding Richardson presume Trump’s benevolence while never defending what she’s actually documenting isn’t rigorous critique. It’s sophisticated apologetics for authoritarian power, wrapped in false concern about methodology.

The question isn’t why Republicans don’t trust journalism. The question is why journalism should accommodate information ecosystems that systematically fail to transmit basic facts, then attack journalism for covering those facts as if accuracy itself constitutes bias.

“If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.” — George Orwell